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Quick, picture an Internet sex predator. If you're like many members of the public, you probably pictured a middle-aged man clicking away on social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace as he lies to kids he meets about his age and intentions. Such a picture doesn't survive an encounter with data, though; social networking sites are actually safer than chat rooms and instant messaging, while most perpetrators are upfront about both their ages and desires.

These are the results from a new study in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Michele Ybarra and Kimberly Mitchell used data from 1,588 10- to 15-year-old Internet users to investigate online sexual harassment, and what they found was actually quite disturbing. In the last year, 15 percent of all the kids surveyed reported an "unwanted sexual solicitation online." Most of these never turn out to be more than an unwanted message on the computer screen, but still, there's plenty to be said for serious parental involvement with younger kids' computing habits.

The good news, at least for social networking sites, is that only less than a third of these solicitations came through social networking sites. IM and chat rooms were much more likely to deliver unsolicited sex chat.

The results led the study's authors to conclude that "broad claims of victimization risk, at least definedas unwanted sexual solicitation or harassment, associated withsocial networking sites do not seem justified."

The result is of more than academic interest, as Congress has considered legislation that would specifically restrict access to social networking sites in schools and libraries on the grounds that such sites are dangerous. The Deleting Online Predators Act, for instance, has already popped up more than once despite concerns that its wording is overbroad.

MySpace has also come under heavy criticism from a group of US Attorneys General, though it has recently manage to appease them by implementing a long list of safety practices.

While such practices are commendable and useful, the report suggests that we not give ourselves a false sense of security by demonizing social networking sites at the expense of bigger threats.

One curious sidenote in the report was the finding that those who do the harassing online don't bother to hide their ages or intentions; in fact, they're quite upfront with their potential victims. This was quite a surprise to the researchers, who note that "in the majorityof cases referred to law enforcement (95%), adult offendersare honest about being an adult, and in 79% of the cases, theyare honest about their intentions to have sex with the youth."

So... that's commendable.

One possible problem with the report: by surveying only 10- to 15-year-olds, most of who are barred from social networking sites like MySpace, the authors may be undercounting the risk to actual users of such sites.